Samantha Raphelson

Vice President Mike Pence is facing backlash for his staunch efforts to ignore North Korean officials at the Winter Olympic Games, even as the two Koreas continued their temporary truce, marching and competing as one team.

Pence's cold demeanor toward the North Koreans at the Pyeongchang games was overshadowed by friendly cooperation between the North and South. The vice president also drew criticism from some openly gay members of Team USA, who questioned his role at the Olympics due to his anti-LGBT views.

Lawmakers in the United Kingdom are debating a new tax on disposable cups in an effort to cut down on waste.

While the so-called "latte levy" is controversial, the goal is to replicate the success of Britain's tax on plastic bags; their use has declined by 80 percent since the tax was introduced in 2015. Proponents of the tax say it would encourage people to carry around their own reusable cups rather than use disposable ones, which in their current form are difficult to recycle.

Homeless shelters across the country are being strained by frigid weather and a population of people who are homeless that is up for the first time since 2010, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Palestinian Christians attacked the convoy of the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem during a visit to Israeli-occupied West Bank on Saturday to protest the church's controversial property sales to Jewish and Israeli buyers.

President Trump insisted Saturday that he is "a very stable genius," following the recent publication of a book that raises questions about his mental state and fitness for office.

Speaking to reporters at Camp David on Saturday, Trump called Michael Wolff, author of Fire and Fury: Inside The Trump White House, "a fraud" and reiterated his earlier claim on Twitter that Wolff is not trustworthy.

The Douglas County Sheriff's office south of Denver says a suspect fired more than 100 rounds in a shooting that killed one police officer and wounded four others, along with two civilians, on Sunday morning.

The officers were shot after responding to an initial report of domestic violence at the Copper Canyon Apartments just after 5 a.m., Sheriff Tony Spurlock said in a news conference.

Over 26 hours and across 39 time zones, the world is celebrating the end of 2017.

New Year's celebrations kicked off in Samoa, Christmas Island and New Zealand as those countries were the first where the clock struck midnight. Here in the U.S., many events are set to occur under heightened security, including in Las Vegas, which is still reeling from the deadliest mass shooting in the nation's modern history three months ago.

Author Peter Zheutlin never wanted a dog, let alone a rescue. He had always believed, as a lot of people do, that rescue dogs are damaged goods.

Now Zheutlin can't imagine life without a dog, and he's become so driven by the issue of stray dogs that he's written two books about it. He tells Here & Now's Lisa Mullins the number of stray dogs has "cascaded out of control" in some parts of the U.S.

Twenty-nine-year-old Cyntoia Brown has been locked up in a Tennessee prison for 13 years, after she was convicted of first-degree murder and aggravated robbery in the killing of a man who hired her as a prostitute when she was 16.

At trial, Brown's lawyers argued she was a runaway who was raped, abused and forced into prostitution by a man known as "Kut Throat." She will be eligible for parole after she turns 69.

The Irish border has emerged as perhaps the most intractable stumbling block in the United Kingdom's plan to leave the European Union as Prime Minister Theresa May faces a deadline to devise a solution ahead of a Brexit summit next month.

Azzedine Alaia, the French-Tunisian designer known for his figure-sculpting fashions, has died at 77, the French Federation of Haute Couture and Fashion confirmed on Saturday.

In his more than four decades in the fashion industry, Alaia gained a reputation for going rogue; he refused to follow the calendar of international fashion weeks and released his collections only when he was ready. He rose to fame for his body-hugging designs that celebrated the female form.

The Palestinians threatened on Saturday to cease communication with the United States if the White House closes its diplomatic mission in Washington, D.C., lodging a potential thorn in President Trump's plans for Mideast peace.

The State Department says the office of the Palestine Liberation Organization must close under a little-known provision in U.S. law that forbids it from requesting Israelis be prosecuted for crimes against Palestinians. Trump may reverse the closure within 90 days if the Palestinians prove they are engaging in peace negotiations with the Israelis.